LibyaEric LaMont GregoryMore Islamic militant fighters from Libya, most from eastern Libya the centre of the current uprising against Qaddafi, went to Iraq with the express purpose of killing Americans, than from any other Muslim country.Based on documents captured by counterinsurgency operatives along Iraq’s Syrian border ‘Libyans were more fired up to travel to Iraq to kill Americans than anyone else in the Arabic-speaking world.’These facts, if nothing else, should sound a word of caution to those in Washington that are eager to arm Libyan rebels.In intelligence circles, there is a long catalogue of Libyan involvement in sponsoring anti-American interests in international affairs, and with the proven links to Lockerby and now anti-American personnel targeting in Iraq, it will come as no surprise that the American Military favors Qaddafi's rather swift removal. The motivation on the part of the US Military is pruely and simply revenge.In modern terms, the US State Department is as much involved in the conduct of an American/NATO led military action as is the military itself, and this fact raises several distinct problems. Not the least of which is a blurring of what should be a clear distinction between military objectives and the State Department's desire to steer post-conflict realities in one direction or another. If the goal is a swift overpowering military response to render Qaddafi's military capabilities moot, then let the military bring the amount of force necessary to achieve that objective to the battlefield.What should have been a six-day campaign is turning into a conflict of indeterminant length. The air capabilities of the Qaddafi forces should have been taken out in the first hour of the NATO action.There will be ample time for the State Department to meddle in the chaos that will ensue in the aftermath.In fact, the rationale behind the US Secretary of State meeting Libyan rebel leaders in Paris with known ties to al-Qaeda, needs to be explained in association with the policy initiatives such contacts support, and the messages it sends to the other failing states in the area crumbling under the weight of autocratic rule. Surely, is it not the intention of the US Administration to foster trading autocracy for theocracy, where does that get us, but a wider arena in which Iran will attempt to gain and spread its brand of anti-Americanism as a policy of spreading its influence in the area. Iran has recently shown its ability to increase American and Allied casualties in Iraq and Afghanistan with the re-inrtoduction of the IRAM, or Improvised Rocket-Assisted Munition, a rarely used weapon that U.S. intellligence officials say is connected to Iran.At this time, perhaps a review of our support for the Islamic anti-Soviet forces in Pakistan, will remind us that putting arms and insurgency training in the hands of Islamic militants might not be a very good idea. In fact, it is a very bad idea.